


Don't Leave Me This Way

by FestiveFerret



Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Aftermath of Torture, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Badly Hurt Tony, Broken Steve, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt/Comfort, Kidnapped, Love, Love Confessions, M/M, Pain, Recovery, Rescue, Torture, injuries, trapped together
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-11
Updated: 2019-09-11
Packaged: 2020-10-14 09:56:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,914
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20598863
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FestiveFerret/pseuds/FestiveFerret
Summary: Tony can see a way out, but he has to go alone.





	Don't Leave Me This Way

**Author's Note:**

> For the hurt/comfort bingo event in the MCU Stony discord bingo! This fills square T1 - "Torture"
> 
> Huge thank you to betheflame for beta and avengersNewB for the title! And of course the whole discord for helping me plan and being wonderful.

Tony shifted on the hard tile floor with a moan of pain. Shock radiated out from his hip bone down his leg and to his ankle, twice the size it should have been and throbbing. He could feel every heartbeat shudder through the agonized nerves in his entire body. There was a huge part of him that just wanted to pass out, not think about it anymore.

"Steve?" he tried, but his voice was so rough and dry that it came out as barely more than a whine.

Steve was slumped on the other side of the sterile, white room, a pool of red staining the hard tile under him. He hadn't moved in a distressingly long time. Tony tried again. "Steve!" It came out a fully formed word this time.

There was a vague grunt, or maybe a gasp, from Steve's corner of the room, but it wasn't followed by anything more lucid, and Tony despaired. He was trying to shuffle himself up into a more upright position, when the door slammed open and two men walked in.

"He's going to die," Tony started before they'd even crossed the threshold. "He's dying. You went too far, and he's going to die, and then you won't have your damn leverage anymore. Please, you need to get him medical help. It's in your best int-" A harsh slap across the face cut off Tony's words and he couldn't stop the whimper that leaked out. His head pounded so heavily, he could barely make out the man's reply, blood thudding in his ears.

"Maybe if he dies, you'll realize how serious we are about this and you'll stop fucking us around," he said, crouching down to Tony's level. "Maybe he dies and we don't have to listen to his whiny bitch voice anymore. All sounds good to me."

"Fuck you," Tony spat. "You need him." 

The man leaned closer, light glinting off the metal frame of his glasses. There was a blood stain on the corner of the lens, and Tony wondered if it bothered him, obscured his vision. Maybe he was used to it. "The only thing I need," he whispered, low and private and just for Tony, "is for you to tell us how to get around your AI."

Tony swallowed heavily. Steve was going to die. And then he was going to die. There was no other way for this to end. No one knew where they were, and they were far enough underground that the trackers under the skin in Tony's arm couldn't get a signal. It was almost a cruelty, that they hadn't managed to cut it out yet, leaving a false hope as they wandered their knife tips over his body. He had the means for rescue right at his fingertips, but there was twenty feet of dirt and rock above his head that prevented it. So they were both going to die, and there was nothing he could do about it.

He shook his head, chin lolling back and forth as his neck throbbed and whined with pain and he lost control of the muscles.

The man shrugged. "That's okay. I have time." He snapped his fingers and the other man shuffled over and undid Tony's handcuffs. He'd fought back at first, at every available moment, and he'd landed a few good shots, but they'd repaid him for every one and there was always someone else at the man's beck and call. 

Even if it might have helped, Tony was pretty sure he didn't have the strength to try anymore, anyway.

The lackey hauled Tony up by one arm and dragged him out of the room after the man with the glasses. Tony didn't know any of their names, and their faces had started to blur together over the days. 

All he knew was that they wanted codes to bypass JARVIS' protection systems. It'd get them access to the tower, and to Tony's suits. He couldn't give them up. He just couldn't.

But they still tried.

**

The men dropped Tony in a sweat-soaked heap on the floor. He blinked blood out of his eyes and squinted at the other side of the room where Steve was still a mess, slumped against the wall. Tony stared until he caught the slight up and down movement of his chest before he was able to let out a breath of his own. Still alive.

One of the men bent and started to re-cuff Tony's arms behind his back. As he was clicking the second bracelet into place, Steve startled awake with a wretched cough, chains rattling. Both men jerked up, frightened, and Tony strained to see. Steve's eyes were closed - one swollen beyond opening, and the other squeezed tight in pain, but he was moving, shifting to slump down on his other side.

The cold metal of the cuffs dug into Tony's wrist, and he twisted then instantly stilled. One of the cuffs hadn't been tightened all the way before the man turned to watch Steve struggle against his pain. 

They'd started out cuffing Tony's ankles too, but now his right was too swollen to fit so they'd given up, likely thinking he wasn't much of a flight risk at this point anyway. That meant that they were relying on keeping Tony's wrists cuffed to the huge loops screwed into the wall to keep him away from Steve, and counting on the locked door for everything else.

Tony shifted, tugging against his bonds and wincing, rattling the chain in a way that made it sound like he was trying to get free but couldn't. The men's attention was drawn from Steve, who seemed to have passed out again, back to Tony.

"Have a nice night," one man jeered, grinning a set of broken, yellow teeth at him.

Tony growled, rumbling low in his chest, but it only made the men laugh, and, to his immense relief, they left without checking Tony's wrists again.

Tony made himself take four calm breaths before he tested the give in the cuff. It was about three clicks too wide, and he had narrow wrists as it was. He tucked his thumb in and tugged. It was tight, but he braced his elbow against his side and wriggled, and though the metal dug sharply into his palm, he made progress. After a few tugs, he was free.

"Fuck," he gasped as he twisted his arm forward into his lap. A flush of hot relief drew sweat to his skin from head to toe. He wasn't out yet, but it was a first step. The chain of the cuff had been drawn through the loop, so he worked the empty cuff through the loop and freed his other hand, still cuffed, with the empty bracelet hanging from it. He pushed up to his hands and knees and willed himself not to vomit, though his stomach rolled and rolled.  _ Steve.  _ He needed to get to Steve.

Tony shuffled across the tile floor, knees aching with every movement. His broken fingers were so numb that it hardly hurt to lean on them. "Steve." He tumbled down, almost landing on top of Steve, his less injured hand reaching out to cup Steve's jaw.

As soon as he touched him, Steve startled awake with a gasp. "Tony?" he croaked.

"Steve. You're okay. It's okay." 

"Tony…" Steve's eyes squeezed shut again. "I'm - everything  _ hur-" _

"I know, I know. I'm sorry." Tony petted his thumb over Steve's blood-smeared cheek. "You're going to be okay, though. I've got a plan. I'm getting us out." Tony's voice broke on the last word. He  _ did  _ have a plan. He'd been staring at the cold air return vent at the top of the room for days, wishing he was free of the cuffs to get to it. He could get out, up to the surface, and call for help. 

But he couldn't bring Steve with him.

"Steve. Steve." Tony waited until Steve managed to focus on his face. "I have a plan, okay. I can get out of here and I can get help. I have a plan… but -" Tony's voice shook, cracked, broke. "I have to go alone."

"No… no, no, no, Tony, no - don't go," Steve begged. "Don't leave me here."

Tony tried to suck back a sob, but it ripped harshly out of his chest, anyway. "Steve… please. I have to go. I'm not leaving you - I'm getting help. I'm getting you out."

"Tony…" The agony in Steve's voice was unbearable. The room was well-lit, but Tony couldn't look at Steve's injuries. He kept his eyes fixed on Steve's face instead, bruised and bloodied, but still Steve.

"You're going to be okay, okay? Steve. I have to go. I'm so sorry, but I have to."

Steve curled over onto himself, straining his arms where they were chained behind his back. Tony tried to catch him, lift his face up again, but his broken hand couldn't get a grip and Steve was too heavy. He shuffled closer, ignoring the screaming in his knees, and pressed their foreheads together. 

Steve whined, broken and gasping. "I can't do this alone. Please don't leave me, Tony. Don't leave. Please, please."

_ "Fuck -"  _ Tony was shaking now, not sure if it was from cold, pain, or sheer despair. He had no choice. There was a horrible, gut-wrenching, terrible possibility that the men would kill Steve when they found Tony gone, but if Tony stayed, they'd kill them both for sure. He had to leave Steve behind, and Steve was too far gone, too hurt, broken, and lost, to understand that. "I'm sorry," he whispered. "I'm sorry. I wish - It's okay. It's going to be okay. The team will come. We'll get you out. We're getting you out. You just have to hang on for a little longer."

"I can't," Steve gasped, his chest heaving with ragged, panicky breaths. Tony could feel the clock clicking down in his chest before someone would come to rip holes in one or both of them. Every minute counted. He had to move. But Steve curled into his body, shaking and sobbing. "Don't go. I need you, Tony. Don't go." Steve sucked in a shaky breath and met Tony's eyes. "Please?"

"I'm so sorry." Tony leaned in and pressed their lips together. He couldn't feel Steve's heat, couldn't taste the brush of his lips. They were both cold and only the metallic tang of blood reached Tony's tongue, but he held them together for as many heartbeats as he could risk. "I will get help. You're going to be okay. I - I love you. And I need to tell you that when you're conscious enough to understand, so there's no fucking way I'm letting you die here, alright?"

Steve whined and pressed even harder into Tony's space, until there was legitimate concern for his shoulders, arms wrenched back as they were.

"Shhh. Just sit back. Keep breathing. Help will be here in no time. Okay? Okay. I -" Tony cut himself off. There wasn't much more he could say. He turned and started an agonized shuffle across the floor.

"No  _ please! _ Tony - no!" Steve begged and sobbed. "Don't go. Don't leave me here. Please. Pease. I can't - I can't. Tony, d-don't go."

It took every ounce of Tony's strength to drag himself away from Steve, unable to block out his wretched pleas. The cold air return vent was large - they'd need a pretty intense circulation system to handle a space of this size, this far underground. To Tony's delight, it was only a few screws that held the vent cover in place. He painstakingly unscrewed them, using the edge of his ring to twist them loose. He pulled the cover off and set it on the ground. Ideally, he'd put it back on after going through, but he wasn't going to be able to turn around in the small vent.

Panic - hot and acidic - welled up at the thought. He was going to be trapped in the vent, only able to go forward or back up blindly, and if it didn't lead to the surface, they were both dead. And Steve would die thinking Tony had abandoned him. Tony swallowed back the knot in his throat and pushed forward. He had no other option, and time was running out.

The metal vent groaned and dented with every step, and Tony died a little each time, imagining the sound echoing through the whole complex and alerting everyone to his escape. He could still hear Steve's begging cries behind him, breaking off to anguished, wordless sobs as Tony shuffled further down the vent. He just had to focus, foot by foot. It was Steve's only chance. 

The pain that had bled together into a haze of formless agony in the room was now lighting up, intense and clear, each injury taking turns to stab shooting pains through his nerves. His fingers on the right were broken. Right ankle was severely strained. A stab wound in his stomach had been bleeding on and off for far too long. He categorized everything as he crawled through the vent, giving his mind something to focus on that wasn't claustrophobia, how badly he wanted to lie down and go to sleep, or the fact that he'd left his heart behind in that damn white tiled room, clutching in Steve's trembling hands.

Loving Steve was something he'd been doing for a while now, though saying it out loud was entirely new. Their friendship… partnership… whatever it was, wasn't always easy. They pushed each other's buttons without trying, constantly set each other off, but they were both  _ trying  _ too, that was the thing. People who didn't get Tony rarely tried, but Steve was trying, every day, to do better, to communicate better, to be there for him even when he didn't understand why he was needed. And that made Tony try. He slowed down, took time to listen, forced himself to consider the big picture, even when the small was screaming at him to  _ move now, do the thing.  _ And somehow, in amongst all that trying, failing, and trying again, he fell in love.

It wasn't the kind of love that burned to be acted on, but he did crave being at Steve's side as much as possible, wallowing in him, breathing him in. The trying got so easy it didn't feel like trying anymore, and then, magically, Steve was his best friend. Tony couldn't exactly say he  _ didn't  _ want more, but he was perfectly content without it. Loving Steve was like carrying around this glowing ball - sometimes it was a bit heavy, sometimes it was in the way, but it was warm and bright and meant he had something to hold close to him when everything else got hard and lonely. It was like the arc reactor, really, tucked into his chest. Not without pain, but saving his life every day. That was Steve, his love for Steve.

But he didn't have that glowing warmth with him now. He'd left it behind, handed it off to Steve with their first - maybe only - kiss, cold and tasteless, and every atom in his body yearned to go back and be reunited with it. The vent cut off suddenly, turning left or right. Tony weighed the odds in his head and turned left. It was pitch black, and he was sweating and shaking, his hands barely supporting his weight as they screamed in pain. He just wanted to lie down, but if he did, he wouldn't get up again.

He just had to keep going.

He had to keep going.

Time fuzzed and blurred and a few times Tony startled sharply, not sure if he'd slipped off to sleep or if it was just his body flushing him with desperate doses of adrenaline, trying to pull him to the finish line. 

And then, suddenly, the vent ended. 

It opened out into nothing, and Tony reeled for a moment, lost, but he blinked and his eyes cleared and it wasn't pitch black here. There was emergency lighting, and more light leaking in from gaps in doorways above… an elevator shaft! He was in the main elevator shaft, and that had to lead up to the surface. 

He waited, sucking in short shallow breaths to keep his aching lungs from seizing, until he was sure he had adjusted to the light, then took stock of the situation.

Obviously, he wanted to go up. But the only way up was a maintenance ladder that would be incredibly painful to climb. His other option was to take the elevator car itself, but it was a few floors below him, and brought with it the risk of being caught. He could go three floors down to the car, or ten floors up to the surface. If someone took the elevator up while he was on the ladder… it wasn't actually clear from the design if he'd be struck or not.

That cinched it. Down it was. 

Maneuvering around to the edge of the ladder was fraught, and Tony expected to go tumbling down at any moment. His broken fingers couldn't grip, his swollen ankle was barely able to bend, and it was only adrenaline that was keeping his muscles from giving out completely. He reached for the top bar and tried to hold on, but blood and sweat made his palm slippery, and for one heart stopping moment, he had no balance. But he managed to snap his other hand into place and hold on with everything he had until his good foot caught a lower rung. He pressed himself against the ladder and gasped out broken breaths for several minutes, the metal digging hard and cold into his cheek. 

When his chest stopped cramping, Tony slowly shifted one foot down to the rung below and wiggled until he could get a good grip with his toes. It was misery to put all his weight on his swollen ankle, but he gripped the upper rung as tightly as he could and eased himself down. 

It took a lifetime to work his way to the bottom. His ears strained for the sound of the elevator powering up, or the shouts of guards realizing he was gone, every muscle shook with the strain of supporting his weight, and his heart and lungs squeezed and stuttered in his chest, barely giving him the oxygen he needed to stay conscious. 

Finally, Tony's foot hit the top of the elevator car and he let out a grateful whimper. He dropped down roughly until he was sitting at the bottom of the ladder, rested his head against the wall, and didn't move for several minutes. 

But the longer he sat, the more at risk he was of getting caught, and the more danger Steve was in. So Tony rolled onto his elbows and crawled across the surface of the elevator. He raked his eyes over the structure, marking where the electrical conduits ran. It would be hard to hot wire it from the outside, even though riding up on top would be safer, where anyone who saw it would think it was moving empty. But after a few minutes of poking, Tony decided going inside had to be worth the risk. The metal casing on the outside was too thick to get through without the Iron Man armour or some specialized tools, and he had nothing. 

He unlatched the trapdoor and sucked in a deep breath. Surely, there wouldn't be anyone in there, just standing around. The elevator hadn't moved in the entire time he'd been climbing down. Of course, it would be just his luck to have someone step in the second he opened the hatch.

But when he pried it open with a grunt and let it fall, unable to manage cracking it first to check, the elevator was blessedly empty. He tipped forward, trying to swing down into the car, and ended up plummeting headfirst through the hole and landing in a gasping pile on the carpeted floor. 

"Fuck…" he groaned. Everything hurt so much it was hard to determine if the fall had done any lasting damage. He was one, big, sodden mess of lasting damage. 

But the doors were closed and the elevator was empty, so he had to be grateful for small mercies. The buttons needed a keycard to be activated, but Tony made short work of the key card swiper, pulling it straight off the wall and bypassing the controls. It  _ might  _ ping at a security desk somewhere, he didn't know what kind of operation this was, but hopefully by the time they mobilized, he'd be long gone. He pushed the button for the ground floor and almost sobbed with relief when the elevator hummed and started rising.

Tony shoved himself into the corner under the buttons, so he wouldn't immediately be a sitting duck when the doors opened, but when they did, all was quiet. He peered around the wall and was faced with a long, empty hallway with a door at the end. On the other side of the door was sunlight.

Tony swallowed heavily and used the edge of the broken keycard scanner to pull himself to his feet - well, foot.  _ So close.  _ He took a few stumbling steps forward, but his ankle had finally given up and he ended up staggering sideways into the wall, smashing his shoulder against the drywall. Bracing himself against the wall, and leaving a streak of blood and dirt as he moved, he shuffled down the hallway, one stumbly half-step at a time. 

When he reached the door, he expected there to be some final hurdle - a lock, an alarm, a guard,  _ something,  _ but when he threw his nearly useless body at the door, it opened, and spat him out on cold, hard ground. 

"Oh my god," Tony gasped, rolling on his back to face the sky. "Holy shit." His hand went straight to the tracker in his arm, finding the small bump and tapping it in a memorized rhythm. It flashed red twice. "Holy shit." The distress signal had been sent, and that meant JARVIS would be doing everything in his power to get help to Tony's location.

Tony started laughing, and he couldn't stop, even knowing that anyone could find him out here, exposed, and drag him back to that white tile room, even knowing that he'd left Steve alone down there, he couldn't stop. 

Eventually, when the laughter had turned into gasped breaths that were verging on sobs, Tony forced himself up to his hands and knees and crawled across the concrete to a copse of trees on the edge of the entrance to the complex. If he went too far, he'd have to lead them back to find Steve, but the closer he stayed, the more at risk he was of being caught. Still, the Avengers had his coordinates now, so even if they found him and took him back down, they'd still find him. They'd still be able to rescue Steve.

Steve…

Tony curled up under a bush and listened for quinjet engines.

**

" -ony."

**

"No…" Tony batted a hand away. It was touching his broken fingers and it hurt like fuck. "Stop."

"Tony."

**

"Tony…" Nat's gentle fingers landed on Tony's jaw.

"Nat," he croaked. "Get Steve."

"Where is he?"

"Down below. Three floors from the bottom. White tile room. Chained up. He's hurt really bad, can't walk. Please go get him."

"We're getting him, Tony. It's okay. You rest."

Two enormous arms slipped under Tony's body, and, with a grunt, the Hulk lifted him up and cradled him gently against his body. Tony could hear shouting, but it was muffled and distant, and when he was laid gently on something soft and warm, he couldn't fight sleep anymore.

**

Tony woke up as they were moving him into the tower. 

They'd all learned long ago not to take injured teammates to a hospital. Tony was rich enough, and the Avengers were needed enough, that emergency services could meet them at the tower. They had all the equipment available for anyone who needed it, and it was more comfortable to suffer in their own beds anyway. 

Tony tried to pass out again as the medics fussed over him, resetting fingers, sewing up stab wounds, and finding the source of all the bleeding, but to his frustration, this time, his body refused to go offline. Morphine helped a little bit, but every time someone moved him, the pain spiked up again. 

When Clint appeared at his side, Tony forced his dry, heavy tongue to move. "Steve?" he rasped.

"Alive," Clint said, not one for sugarcoating. "He's stable. The serum should fix it all, but it's going to take a while." He cleared his throat, eyes jumping over Tony's gauze-covered body. "Mentally… he's kind of messed up, right now. He's confused and upset. I'm not sure he really knows what happened. But he'll be okay, Tony. So will you."

Tony nodded and let his eyes fall shut again. "Thanks."

Taped, sewed, glued, and snapped back into one piece, the medical team finally left, and Tony allowed himself to drift for a while. He wasn't sure how long it had been when he came back to full consciousness, but the tower was dark and quiet, with the soft closeness of nighttime. The morphine had started to turn his stomach, so Tony half-rolled over and squeezed the IV closed. He unclicked the line from the butterfly taped in the back of his hand and carefully pushed himself up to sitting. 

The room spun in wide, jagged circles, and Tony had to reach for the garbage bin next to the bed. He threw up all the nothing he had in his stomach, and then some, stomach still heaving long after there wasn't even any bile left to give. His throat burned, but in a familiar way that was somehow settling. He'd been taken apart, piece by piece, but this pain was part of being put back together again, and that made it worth it. If he could survive what he went through in Afghanistan, he could survive this.

But Steve… Clint had said he wasn't doing well, mentally, and Tony didn't blame him. He'd left him there alone, begging and pleading with Tony to stay. He'd abandoned him entirely, and though he'd saved both their lives, there was no doubt he'd killed their relationship. How could Steve ever trust him again? He'd needed Tony, and Tony had left. It didn't matter that it was the right choice; it was a pain Steve would carry around forever.

There was a water cup on the bedside table, and Tony sipped at it gingerly, willing it to stay down. The pump on the IV said the last dose was two hours ago, so Tony flopped back down on the bed and waited for it to wear off. He couldn't sleep, but he drifted in and out, until his pain had crept back in enough at the edges that he was fully awake, breathing sharpened by the pull of stitches in his gut and the  _ thump thump  _ throb of his strained ankle. 

He tried not to think about Steve, but his mind wouldn't go anywhere else. How had they hurt him? Tony had never caught site of more than blood - so much blood - and the way Steve's legs wouldn't support him when the men dragged him back in the room. The serum would heal Steve's body, sure, but he had to live with the memories. 

As the morphine finally fully left his system, Tony ever so carefully eased himself up and out of bed. His doctors would murder him if they saw him walking around, but they hadn't put a catheter in - thank god - and he needed to pee like a racehorse. 

He couldn't put any weight on his bad ankle, so he took the IV stand with him, holding it tightly with his good hand and hopping his way across the room to the en suite. Also, this way, if he fell or got stuck on the toilet, he could give himself another dose of painkillers. Really, he should have left the saline on, but he hated feeling wired up to things. It reminded him of the weight of a car battery in his arms. 

He managed to pee successfully, and while everything hurt, it was still better than than the floaty, out-of-control feeling the morphine gave him, so he didn't plug his IV back in. He washed his hands - well, hand, one was still bandaged to high hell - and started the slow shuffle back to his room. 

But he couldn't climb back into bed. There was a restlessness that overshadowed his pain and his need for sleep, and he knew that if he didn't go at least  _ look  _ at Steve, and know he was here and alive, he'd be lying awake, anxiety ridden, until morning.

The upside was that surely Steve would be asleep, and that would mean Tony wouldn't have to talk to him, wouldn't have to see the pain and hurt and rejection in his eyes when he told Tony to go, that he couldn't bear to look at him anymore, that Tony had shattered his trust. 

So Tony turned towards the elevator instead, using the IV pole to support himself. "JARVIS?" His voice was still rough, but the water had helped some.

"Yes, sir?"

"If I leave the penthouse, am I going to set a bunch of Avengers into hyperdrive?"

"No one has asked me to monitor your whereabouts, if that's what you mean, sir."

"Okay. Great." Tony pushed the button for Steve's floor then leaned back against the far wall. The swoop of the elevator made his stomach lurch and he regretted not bringing the garbage can with him. He closed his eyes and breathed through his nose until the car hummed to a stop and the doors opened. Tony shuffled forward as quietly as the IV pole would allow. He just needed to see him, needed to know he was okay, and then he'd go, go back to bed, and try and get over him.

But when Tony reached the hallway outside Steve's bedroom, a noise stopped his heart. A desperate, gasping sob broke into choppy sniffles, and Tony forgot his ankle and jogged to the door. He pushed it open. "Steve? Are you okay? Does it hurt?"

Steve startled up from where he'd been curled up in bed and stared at Tony. "Tony?"

Tony remembered, heart plummeting into the floor, why he'd been intending to go unnoticed. "Shit. Sorry. I didn't mean to barge in." He turned to go.

"Wait!" Steve called out, then winced with his entire body. "No… I mean. You can go, it's okay. I just - I can't walk yet."

Tony started to chew on his bottom lip then flinched at the pain. It was still broken and bruised. "Do you need something?"

"I… Well, I was hoping I could talk to you. Just for a minute."

"Okay." Tony took another step and grimaced. He was aching and tired and feeling nauseous again, and he regretted coming here. Steve wanted to talk, but Tony wasn't ready to yet.

"Sit. Please." Steve shuffled over a little in bed, and if the movement hurt, he masked it well.

Tony, too exhausted to argue, dropped himself down on the edge of the bed with a groan, his good hand still wrapped around the IV pole to keep himself from tipping off the bed and onto the floor. "Are you okay?" he couldn't help but ask Steve. He wanted to say  _ why were you crying?  _ but he couldn't bring himself to voice it. 

Steve opened his mouth, his brow twisting with distress, but he didn't seem able to find his words.

"I'm sorry," Tony rasped, unable to keep it in any longer. 

And for some reason, that broke Steve's dam.  _ "You're  _ sorry?! Oh god, Tony  _ I'm  _ so sorry. I can't believe I said all that to you, I can't believe I begged you to stay. It was  _ horrible.  _ I'll - I don't think I can ever forgive myself for that. You had a chance to get out and I tried to make you stay behind and die with me. It's -" he choked, words running out again.

"I wanted to stay," Tony admitted. "It killed me to leave you. If it had just been me on the line, I would have stayed."

A tear leaked out and tracked down Steve's cheek, over a dark, purple bruise. "That's even worse…"

Tony reached out, too much like back in the white, tile room, but Steve was here and alive and lucid and they were okay. He cupped Steve's jaw and wiped the tear away with his thumb. 

"Did you mean it?" Steve whispered.

Tony didn't have the strength to be coy or controlled. All his defenses were down. He nodded.

Steve's eyes went wide. "I do too."

"No way." But Tony couldn't drop his hand from Steve's face.

Steve leaned into his touch, eyes fluttering closed for a moment before he fixed them on Tony's face again. "For a while now, actually. Never felt like the right time to say something."

"Steve - I - you better not be messing with me," Tony choked out, half-laugh, half-desperate plea.

"Never." Steve sat up more, shifting forward, and reached out for Tony. He skated his fingertips across Tony's forehead and down over his cheek. "They hurt you so much… I couldn't stop them. I'm sorry."

"It was so much worse for you." Tony's stomach churned. He had the urge to pull his gaze away from the sheer intensity in Steve's, but he couldn't. "We survived, though," he offered.

"You saved us."

"I did it for you." Tony turned so his lips brushed over Steve's knuckles. "If it had just been me, I would have given up."

"Oh, Tony." Steve looked ready to cry again, so Tony leaned forward and kissed him. It was little more than a gentle slide of his lips on Steve's, neither of them whole and healed enough to handle anything more, but it was filled with promise and understanding and love. The rest would come with time. Tony was sure of that, now.

"Will you stay?" Steve asked, the barest of whispers as his mouth moved against Tony's.

And this time, it was so easy for Tony to say, "Yes."

Steve shuffled to the side even more and pushed the blankets down. His chest was a mess of gauze and tape, but Tony hadn't fared much better at the hands of the medics, so he ignored it. They would both heal, eventually. He reconnected his IV and turned the pump back on, figuring the saline would do him good after all the vomiting, and if the morphine gave him weird dreams or kept him awake, at least Steve would be there beside him. He worked his legs under the covers with Steve's help and curled up on his side.

Steve turned to face him, so close Tony could feel the heat of his breath on his cheek. "I love you," Steve said softly, and his hand wriggled under the covers until it found Tony's. He wound their fingers together.

"I love you, too." Tony held him tight. It was too soon for the morphine to kick in, but somehow, he couldn't feel the pain anymore.


End file.
